


hey reaper, will you be my keeper?

by zhujungjungting (runswithchopsticks)



Category: NU'EST, Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence and Blood, businessmen of hell?, death!au?, this seems like a very dark story but i swear it's not, what kind of au is this?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 13:14:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12109488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runswithchopsticks/pseuds/zhujungjungting
Summary: Minhyun burns hearts.





	hey reaper, will you be my keeper?

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by [these](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/5c58q0/wp_i_dont_have_a_heart_she_tapped_her_chest_and_a/) [two](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/3a31gq/wp_the_grim_reaper_has_a_conversation_with_his/) Reddit threads.
> 
> don't really have a music rec for this story, but i listened to primary ft. choa & iron - don't be shy, even though the lyrics and theme do not match with this at all... lol.
> 
> but anyways, thanks for clicking! please enjoy your read. <3
> 
> (unedited besides my own combing. RIP. S has too much shit to do, lol.)

_start_.

* * *

When he looks at the little calendar sitting next to him on his wooden desk, Minhyun sighs. The 5-18 glares, as if mocking him because of its significance, when it really should bear him no weight at all. But he still remembers that day vividly, able to see the event play through his mind as if he were once again standing on the gray pavement, his peers crowded around him, shouts and screams echoing in the air as they all raised their fists.

They say death should have no feeling. When you die, you die -- that’s it. You become cold, both physically and emotionally, because the thing controlling your senses and your thoughts essentially becomes a void. Some people argue that death does harbor some sort of emotion because of speculations such as heaven or hell or purgatory -- afterlife, essentially. But that’s not what Minhyun is talking about when he says that death should have no feeling, because he’s talking about the actual _action_ of dying. That feeling you get when the last light in your eyes fades out and your spirit leaves your physical body.

And that’s Minhyun’s job. To facilitate the action of death.

No, he’s not a killer, that’s the task for one of his other friends. He doesn’t think he has the mental capacity to decide when and how people die.

Rather, he’s the person that goes to meet those people right before their scheduled death. He’ll watch them from afar and amble up to them leisurely as time passes. He’ll stand right next to them, watch the gleam in their pupils fade out, and wait. And once he’s sure they’re actually dead, he’ll reach into their chest, pull out their heart, and press it between his palms as if he’s kneading dough. He’ll extract their soul from that little ugly organ, set it on the ground, and then disintegrate the object in his hand -- burn it into nothing but grey dust, and let those ashes coat the ground. Just not over his shoes, they’re real Italian leather.

He’s been referred to as the “Grim Reaper” by the newly dead, but he honestly doesn’t like to label himself as anything besides what the little placard at his desk says: “Death Facilitator”. Because it’s not like he’s wearing a giant, black, and ominous hood and carrying a scythe that towers over his head. He looks like any normal businessman -- cleanly tailored navy suit, a red tie, and brown dress shoes.

You would think that a person--or really, whatever Minhyun is, since he’s clearly not exactly a person--that has this kind of job is basically a rock. They have no sense of emotion, no sort of light within their soul that would indicate feeling, because who else would be able to handle this kind of task, one where you’re figuratively killing people and literally burning hearts? Well, in Minhyun’s job description, there wasn’t exactly anything that said that he had to be emotionally void, but that somehow seems to be the expectation of everyone when they first meet him.

And, to some degree, Minhyun does _appear_ emotionally void, and he sometimes _does_ feel emotionally void--it’s just because he’s gotten used to his job after three decades--but he’s very clearly not.

Because the number 5-18 means something to him.

The sky that day, it was a little gray, but still maintained its blue hue. He thought that might be an omen, might be a good sign, or at least it meant that things wouldn’t turn out terrible. Oh boy, was he wrong.

He can still feel the wind against his face, feel the warmth of the bodies of other students crowding around him. He can feel the anger in his heart as he screamed with the rest of them, storming the plaza. He can still feel his left hand gripped around the wrist of the man that ran next to him, because they were afraid they’d lose each other in the crowd if they were physically separated.

But he can also still remember the jump in his heart as the first gunshot rang out.

He can remember ducking his head down and running for his life, the other man next to him still in tow, the screams of his peers dissipating into sizzling background noise because there was simply so much fear in him at that moment.

He remembers feeling a harsh tug on his arm.

“Minhyun!” he hears, as if he were still standing there, right on the gray pavement, thirty years ago.

He turns his head, and there’s Jonghyun staring up at him, his eyes wide with just as much panic as Minhyun feels. “The south road,” Jonghyun says, and he has to shout for his voice to be heard over the chaos, “we need to get off campus as fast as we can.”

So Minhyun just nods and follows Jonghyun’s footsteps as they’re running, their sneakers making no noise as they cross over the cracked and worn pavement.

But, ah, this is the part where Minhyun’s hopes are lost.

They’re almost to the edge of campus, and when they round the corner of the road, Minhyun nearly crashes into Jonghyun as Jonghyun skids to a stop.

“Stop!” he hears, and he’s suddenly staring at the barrel of a gun pointed directly at him.

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Jonghyun begin to turn with the intent of running in the opposite direction, but in his regular field of vision, he also sees the position of the military officer’s hand shift.

“No!” he cries, throwing himself to the side, effectively ramming Jonghyun to where he falls to the ground. There’s the ringing of a gunshot just hardly a fraction of a second later, and Minhyun feels a sharp, tearing pain in his shoulder. He stumbles, just barely managing to not fall, gripping his joint. There’s the warm wetness of blood on his palm, and when he takes his hand and stares at the red coating his fingers, he nearly throws up. But then he remembers there’s a more pressing matter, and he swallows the bile that rises in the back of his throat.

Jonghyun’s on his hands and knees, staring at the pavement below him, and Minhyun can’t do anything but tug on his shirt, trying to pull him up in that barest second that they have. And Jonghyun does stand up for a moment, but he promptly trips the next, the words he’s trying to say a garbled mess hanging off of his lips.

It’s too late, Minhyun knows, when he hears the scraping of Jonghyun’s shoes against the ground as he trips again, another series of gunshots ringing out behind them.

There’s another blossoming stab of pain in the hand that’s gripping Jonghyun’s shirt, and Minhyun instantly lifts his palm up, dripping blood onto Jonghyun as he lets out a cry of distress. But the next shot, now, the next shot figuratively hits him in the heart and literally hits Jonghyun in his stomach.

He sees Jonghyun collapse onto the ground, a pool of blood quickly forming underneath him, and the only thing Minhyun can do is swallow the agony in his throat, will away the pain in his hand and shoulder, and grab at Jonghyun, his hands now coated completely scarlet with blood that he’s not sure is his own.

But Jonghyun slaps his arms away the second later with such a force that Minhyun wouldn’t think came from a person who’s bleeding out on the street.

“Go!” he exclaims, his eyes wide and wild. “Go! Run! Run, you idiot, run!”

“But--” Minhyun begins to protest, but Jonghyun interrupts him.

“What did I just say? Run!”

And then Minhyun glances behind him, at the officer taking slow steps towards him, refilling the bullets in his gun, and then looks down at Jonghyun.

Jonghyun stares at him. For some weird reason, he smiles. “I’ll live,” he says, with such affirmation that Minhyun believes him for a moment. “You’re going to be dead in about a second, Minhyun. Run!”

Minhyun runs.

The ringing of his pager suddenly brings him back to reality.

He jumps in his seat and sighs, sweat beading at his temples. He shouldn’t be remembering these things at this time, or else he’ll have shaky hands for the rest of the day and accidentally burn something other than the heart that he’ll be holding in his palm.

Lifting up the small black device sitting next to him, he peers at the screen. It’s a new message from his friend Sungwoon, one of the guys that decides when and how people die.

_Get down to Gwanghwamun Plaza. Kim Jonghyun is his name, he’ll be wearing a black baseball cap and a blue jacket._

Minhyun sighs. _Oh,_ he thinks, _Jonghyun’s finally going to die_. This will be interesting when they finally lay eyes on each other. What will Jonghyun look like? He would be in his fifties right now. What kind of job would he have--or now, have had? Would he have had a family as well? A wife?

There’s a prickly tangle of emotions sitting in the pit of Minhyun’s stomach. The idea that Jonghyun has probably found someone else to love isn’t the thing that’s making him uncomfortable, because he knows that that fact was bound to happen, and over thirty years of separation and thirty years of working with death has dulled the pain in his heart that he feels for a lost love. Rather, for one, he’s just plainly excited that he’s going to be seeing the only person he’s ever loved again. But he’s also simultaneously terrified, because he’s going to be burning Jonghyun’s heart. Just like he did, at least figuratively, thirty-something years ago.

* * *

When Minhyun looks at the coordinates on his pager, he furrows his brows. He’s standing at the edge of the plaza, staring down the center of the area. Cars pass him on either side, separated from him by an iron fence, their typical traffic noises flying by his face, but they all blur behind him in one honking mess because he’s staring critically at his pager, making sure he’s reading the numbers on the screen correctly. According to what Sungwoon sent him, the location of Jonghyun’s death would be near the statue of King Sejong at the middle of the plaza, which is entirely strange because Minhyun expected Jonghyun to be hit by a car or something. After all, that was one of the most common causes of death Sungwoon chose -- Minhyun’s friend preferred death to be, ah, a little more physical.

But Minhyun figures Jonghyun could die from a heart attack or something too. Who knows? People over the age of fifty do possess a fair share of ailments.

Minhyun begins his leisurely stroll, hands tucked casually in his suit pants pockets. But his legs still itch a little and a few butterflies still flit around in his stomach because he’s apprehensive -- anxiously anticipating what is going to happen. How will Jonghyun react when he sees him after all these years? How will _Minhyun_ react? What is Minhyun going to do? Yeah, it’s been his job to burn hearts for decades, but he’s most definitely going to have trouble burning Jonghyun’s. He figures that when he has to do it, he’ll just shut his eyes and try to imagine nothing but white.

Glancing down at his pager once more, he makes sure he’s walking on time. And yup, he is. Several more minutes, and he’ll be right where he needs to be a minute before the time Sungwoon gave him.

He continues on, sometimes glancing around him at the people in the plaza. At the families with their children, playing in the water. At the students chattering away with each other as they walk around in blobs, shopping bags in tow and backpacks resting on their shoulders. At the tourists with their cameras and their fanny packs and their clunky sneakers. Minhyun would stick out like a sore thumb, a lone young man wearing a cleanly pressed suit, but that’s only if they could see him.

He chuckles for a moment, because if they could, they’d probably think he were some office worker that’s out walking about during his lunch break, albeit at an odd place to walk for a lunch break. None of them would realize that they’re staring at an incarnation of death right before their faces.

This little thought entertains him for the next several minutes as he slowly makes his way down the plaza.

And when the statue of King Sejong becomes clear in his field of vision, he glances at his pager to remind himself of what he’s looking for. Black baseball cap, blue jacket.

Minhyun sees those things up ahead. There’s a man standing near the corner of the statue with his back facing Minhyun, staring up at the statue’s face. The stature he has, his height, the way his arms dangle at his side -- they’re all such small little nuances, but they’re all so painstakingly familiar to Minhyun that he can’t help but become more agitated. When you’ve come to know someone so well, someone that you’ve seen almost every day of your life, someone you’ve spent so much of your free time with, someone whose lines on their body you’ve memorized in your heart, it’s so easy to pick up those tiny little insignificant details and instantly know that it’s them.

Even after over three decades, those details are still carved into Minhyun’s memories.

His feet want to hurry themselves, but he forcibly denies them their desire. If he were to get there early, he’d have to wait, and his little suffering would be drawn out longer.

He approaches Jonghyun, coming to a stop several meters behind him, hands still tucked into his pockets. He stands, waiting, staring at Jonghyun’s back. Jonghyun doesn’t move, his eyes still trained on the statue above him.

Minhyun grinds his jaw. Now he’s entirely curious what kind of death Sungwoon chose for him. Briefly, he mentally prays that it wasn’t something painful, but then he reminds himself that that’s not how death works -- and it doesn’t even matter anyway, because once you’re dead, you’re dead. Doesn’t really matter how you died either -- or at least, it doesn’t matter to people like Minhyun and Sungwoon, who don’t exist in the real world.

He’s momentarily so caught up in his thoughts that he doesn’t realize that Jonghyun’s turned and is now looking at him.

Minhyun catches his eye and nearly topples over in shock, his eyes widening enormously, because he feels like he’s just been punched in the head. _What the hell?_ he thinks.

Jonghyun looks _the same_. As in, _the same as last time Minhyun saw him. Over thirty years ago_. He’s got that same slightly angular face, the same youthful eyes, the same little smile planted on his lips, the same perpetually worried and caring stare. Even his aura is the same -- quiet, thoughtful, placid, stable.

Minhyun just stands there, gaping. He realizes Jonghyun is looking directly at him too, but he just assumes he’s staring in his direction, because no human being that’s alive can see him. He’s so lost in his thoughts of, _How in the world is this possible?_ and _Oh, he’s still as handsome as ever_ that he doesn’t realize that Jonghyun is taking slow steps towards him.

“Minhyun,” Minhyun hears, and he’s instantly thrown out of his thoughts. That voice, it’s so, so, so achingly familiar, it’s like a bell has been struck in his heart. His name, slipping off of that tongue, it brings back so many memories to him, all the good and bad and revitalizing and agonizing.

“...What?” Minhyun murmurs. Did Jonghyun just speak  _to_ him?

“Minhyun, is that really you?” Jonghyun asks. He’s now several paces closer, and Minhyun feels like he’s about to faint with how uneasy all of the functions in his body are seeming at the moment. Especially his mind, because he’s so, so utterly confused and so, so utterly overwhelmed with nostalgia and heartache. Yup, he’s definitely not emotionally void.

Jonghyun stops a meter or two away from Minhyun, his eyes flickering up and down Minhyun’s frame.

“...What?” Minhyun murmurs again. He can’t process any comprehensible thought.

Jonghyun gulps. “Nevermind,” he quickly says, biting his lip. “Sorry, ah, I thought you were someone else.” He quickly turns around and begins to walk away.

“No!” Minhyun immediately exclaims, and Jonghyun stops in his tracks, his back still facing Minhyun.

“You look the same as you did the last time I saw you,” Minhyun murmurs, his voice soft, almost hesitant. “How is that possible, Jonghyun?” _Jonghyun_. He hasn’t said that name in what feels like an eternity. It’s like the dust covering a long-lost treasure chest inside of him is being blown off, the spiderwebs scraped away, and iron lock undone as that name falls off of his lips.

Jonghyun slowly turns around and approaches him, a quiet smile appearing on his face as he does so. “I could ask the same about you, Minhyun,” he replies.

“Wait,” Minhyun starts. The thought had initially passed over his mind, yet it was almost immediately swamped by his emotions. But now, it returns, as perplexing as ever. “You can _see_ me?”

Jonghyun looks at him oddly. “Well, yeah,” he replies. “Why wouldn’t I be able to? You’re standing right there in front of me.”

 _Wait_ , Minhyun thinks. The only other people that would be able to see him are those that are already dead. Jonghyun is clearly not dead, because Minhyun hasn’t extracted his soul yet, and not to mention that his physical body isn’t lying on the ground.

But Minhyun still glances at the time on his pager.

It’s two minutes past the time Jonghyun is scheduled to die.

“...Are you already dead?” Minhyun asks, slowly.

“What?” Jonghyun immediately replies. “I’m not dead, or else how would I be able to talk to you right now?”

“But, how would you be able to talk to me if you _aren’t_ dead?” Minhyun asks, critically. He narrows his eyes. “What the hell is going on?” he murmurs.

“Uh,” Jonghyun begins, furrowing his brows, “what do you mean? Minhyun, are you okay?”

Minhyun nods. Yes, he’s okay, for the most part. But then he shakes his head the next second. “I’m so confused,” he mutters, “let me get things straightened out. How do you look the same as you did thirty-seven years ago? You would be fifty-eight right now. How is that possible? Is there some kind of new cosmetic surgery thing I’m not aware of?” Yeah, he’s been entirely detached from the human world. The world he lives in is still a few paces behind in terms of technology, as shown by his pager.

Jonghyun shrugs. “I don’t know,” he replies. “I just stopped aging after that thing when you… died.”

“Oh,” Minhyun murmurs. Well, that doesn’t explain anything. They’re both clueless on that. “Well, okay.”

“Then, how do you still look the same?” Jonghyun asks, critically. “Actually, are you really dead? People just told me you died, but there was no funeral and I never saw anything, only heard what others said--”

“I’m dead,” Minhyun replies, blatantly. “That’s why I asked you how you’re able to see me. Because the living can’t see the dead. Or at least, they’re not supposed to.”

“ _What_?” Jonghyun asks, incredulously, his eyes widening. “Then how-- what--”

“Exactly.” Minhyun sighs, bowing his head.

“I’m quite sure I’m alive,” Jonghyun begins, turning around in his spot and looking around, his movements almost panicked. “I swear, when I walked over here, someone said hi to me and I said hi back, so I’m not dead -- how is this possible? I’ve never seen spirits or… whatever, before.” And then he rubs his eyes with the heels of his palms. “I’m not hallucinating and just imagining things, am I?”

“No,” Minhyun replies. “I’m standing right here.”

Jonghyun takes his hands off of his face and stares right up at Minhyun. “...Then, what’s happening?” he whispers, after a couple of moments.

A sorrowful smile appears on Minhyun’s lips. “You were supposed to die--” he glances at his pager, “--four minutes ago.”

“... _What_?” Jonghyun immediately replies, his eyes widening. “What do you mean?”

“Do you know what the Grim Reaper does?” Minhyun asks.

Jonghyun nods. “He’s that guy that visits you when you die and sends your soul to the afterlife, right? With the hood and the scythe.”

Minhyun sighs. Well, Jonghyun’s got part of that right. “I’m sort of like the Grim Reaper,” he explains, “except I don’t carry a scythe and wear a cloak. They call me a ‘Death Facilitator’. I’m the guy that pulls your soul out of your body. And--”

“So I am dead,” Jonghyun interrupts, his voice hushed. His eyes flit around him. “But I just-- I was just walking, and nothing happened, I just walked and then I thought someone was looking at me and then I turned around and you were there…”

“Yeah.” Minhyun nods, pursing his lips. “I don’t know what happened either. When I saw you from a distance, that’s all I saw -- you standing right here. Normally I’d see your physical body lying on the ground or in whatever position you died in, but there’s no physical body of yours. Unless…”

“What?” Jonghyun asks.

“Unless your physical body is somewhere else, and I’m talking to your soul right now. Somehow, your soul managed to escape your physical body without me touching it.”

“Oh,” Jonghyun murmurs. He looks himself up and down curiously. “Am I really… a soul? Am I? If I am, then how would the person I just said hi to around twenty minutes ago be able to see me?”

Minhyun bites his lip. This is the part that he’s been wholeheartedly skittish about. “There’s a way to determine that. Determine if you’re dead or alive,” he murmurs.

“How?” Jonghyun asks.

“The way I take a person’s soul out,” Minhyun begins, “is by reaching into their chest, taking out their heart, and extracting their soul that way. And then I burn the heart, because it’s not needed anymore.”

Minhyun sees Jonghyun swallow anxiously, his lips slightly pursed in apprehensive tension, his eyes a bit wider than normal. It’s a little nerve-wracking for him to see Jonghyun like this, because the last time Jonghyun had this exact expression was when they were running away.

“Try,” Jonghyun whispers, “go ahead, Minhyun, try.”

Minhyun gulps. “O-Okay,” he stutters. Jonghyun looks at him with a little bit of fear in his eyes, but behind that fear, there’s trust. The exact same trust he had when he shouted at Minhyun to run, to run away or else Minhyun would be dead.

Minhyun lifts up his arm, slowly, his fingers outstretched, and presses them to Jonghyun’s chest. His flesh is firm, a little bit warm, the material of his jacket soft under his fingertips. But Minhyun can’t dig his fingers in for some reason, as he normally would be able to when he’s taking someone’s heart out.

“What?” Minhyun murmurs. “This is--” And then instinctively he taps his index finger twice on Jonghyun’s chest. The next moment, he hears a series of clicks and whirs. “What?” he says, again.

Jonghyun’s eyes widen even more, to the point where he looks vaguely bug-eyed. “Oh my god,” he whispers, and his face has paled noticeably.

“What? Jonghyun, _what_?” Minhyun hurriedly asks. “What’s going on?”

Jonghyun hastily unzips his jacket. “Minhyun--” he says, his voice slightly raspy with panic. “Minhyun, I feel something on my chest _moving-_ -”

And then when his jacket falls open, both he and Minhyun stare, shell-shocked.

There’s a latch on Jonghyun’s chest, attached to a little hatch with Jonghyun’s clothing and all, folding in the fabric of his shirt. Minhyun can see faint lines around the latch, forming the shape of a rectangle -- of a _door_.

“Can I?” Minhyun whispers, placing the tip of his index finger on the lock.

Jonghyun looks up at him, his expression apprehensive, fearful, nervous, but still nonetheless _trusting_ , and nods.

So Minhyun slowly pushes the latch to the side and pulls it open.

There’s nothing inside. Only an empty, black compartment. Right where Jonghyun’s heart should be.

Minhyun takes a step back, his hand still poised in the air. “N-No,” he stutters, his voice caught in his throat. “No, how’s that possible? How--”

“I d-don’t know,” Jonghyun replies, his voice a whisper, “I don’t know either.” He’s still staring down at his own chest, at where the little black rectangle is. The next moment, he looks up at Minhyun, who now has a hand clasped over his mouth, frozen in a stupor. “So, what am I now?” he asks, his voice slightly trembling, “am I alive or am I dead?”

Minhyun doesn’t reply, or more like he can’t -- his entire being is shaking right now, shaking from shock and dread and somehow _fear_ , but there’s nothing for him to be afraid of, because it’s not like he has to burn Jonghyun’s heart anymore, right?

Jonghyun takes a small step forward, his torso leaning forward as he does so.

A small pieces of paper falls out of the compartment in his chest, fluttering to the ground gracefully. Minhyun is the one to crouch down and pick it up after both of them stare at it for several long seconds.

It’s folded into a little square, its color very bright and white, as if it were just recently pulled off of the press.

Minhyun unfolds it, Jonghyun watching him intently as he does so.

“What does it say?” Jonghyun whispers.

Minhyun’s breath is caught in his throat, but he forces himself to clear it with a cough the next moment. He begins to read out loud, his voice hushed and shaky.

“ _May 20th, 1980_

_Minhyun,_

_If you’re reading this, I assume that you’ve just discovered what’s happened to me._

_I no longer have a heart, if that wasn’t already a little obvious, haha. It’s a little odd, isn’t it? It feels weird when I tell myself that I don’t have a heart anymore, because that can mean a lot of things, but I mean it literally._

_You’re probably wondering why I don’t have a heart. Well, that’s because I decided to give it to you._

_I hope it’s not all in vain. I hope they treat you well. I hope I made the right decision._

_Actually, I know that I did. I would’ve given you my heart anyways, no matter the circumstance. After all, I already figuratively did._

_If you’re reading this, that means everything went well, didn’t it? I hope you’re living a happy life right now. I hope the people around you treat you nicely and love you. If that’s not so, then I hope you love yourself and remember that at one point in your life, someone loved you with all the strength in their body._

_Sincerely, and with all my heart (pun not intended),_

_Jonghyun_.”

Minhyun slowly lifts his head. “...D-Do you remember writing this?” he asks, his fingers and his lips trembling.

Jonghyun shakes his head, his gaze low. He’s wringing his hands, rubbing his sweaty palms on the thighs of his jeans.

Minhyun closes his eyes for a moment, folding the piece of paper back into its little square. And without another word, he puts it back into the compartment in Jonghyun’s chest and shuts the door, sliding the latch closed.

There’s another series of whirs and clicks, and the hatch melts back into Jonghyun’s shirt, as if it never even existed.

“I don’t know what’s happening,” Minhyun whispers, closing his eyes again, “I don’t know what you are. At this point, I don’t know what I am either.” He opens them the next second, and stares at Jonghyun intently. “I’m probably dead,” he adds, with a haughty smile, “or else how would I be a Death Facilitator?” He reaches forward and grabs Jonghyun’s hand, sliding his fingers under gently, touch feathery and light, cradling it in between his two palms. “I assume that’s what you were trying to prevent,” he murmurs.

Jonghyun nods slowly. “I don’t remember,” he replies, his voice and expression hesitant, “but that seems like what I was thinking.”

“Obviously that didn’t work,” Minhyun notes, with a small huff. “But your wish was granted. It wasn’t in vain. After all--” he brings Jonghyun’s hand up to his lips, his thumb running over Jonghyun’s knuckles, “--we’re reunited. After thirty-seven years. We’re reunited, in the same state as we left each other.” And then he raises an eyebrow. “Right? You do still love me, right?”

Jonghyun smiles. “Why else would I have given you my heart?” he replies, with a soft laugh.

* * *

_fin._

**Author's Note:**

> yo! thanks so much for reading this! <3 hope you liked it. 
> 
> special thanks to V for taking the time to pre-read it and like, analyze shit? don'no. but wtf would i do without her?


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